The 2012 Fifa Coach of the Year praises the contribution that his country has made to the footballing world, and says a homegrown approach to players has been key to their success

EXCLUSIVEBy Greg Stobart in Zurich

Vicente Del Bosque has heaped praise on his country's status in current world football after being named as the coach of the year.

The 62-year-old was awarded with the accolade after winning Euro 2012, and beat Real Madrid boss Jose Mourinho and former Barcelona coach Pep Guardiola to the title.

But the Spain boss was quick to deflect attention from himself onto the fact that two out of the three finalists were from his homeland.

"It is a real pleasure and I take pride that two Spanish coaches are in the top three because our country is at the top of football today," he said in a press conference.

"Formerly we went abroad to pick up players but now not so much, and we are now at the very highest level and there lies one of the main factors why we are where we are."

He added to Goal.com: "As a Spanish representative, I'm happy seeing all these players in the Fifa team. We're all Spanish players or players playing in Spain, so that reflects the wonderful moment we are living.

"Our players have an enormous value and today we've seen it."

He also spoke about his own votes in the Ballon d'Or, and his reasons for them.

"I chose three Spanish players as a general concept of the current state of our football," he said.

"So I named the two captains (Iker Casillas and Xavi) and [Andres] Iniesta, the best European of the year. However, we cannot forget the fight between two great players like [Lionel] Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo."

But despite his country's haul of awards, the national side's boss said they would continue to strive to improve.

"Football never stops. There's always a greater challenge and we got many competitions to face, like the World Cup classification," he said.